Final Homily given on Saturday 3rd July 2010 by The Rt Revd Dr David Stancliffe, Bishop of Salisbury

"FINAL HOMILY"

Many of you know that there’s a rather battered hearthrug in my study. It’s a proper Persian carpet, with its characteristic border defining the space that contains a number of stylized trees and plants. It’s a formal representation of a paradise garden, a small space marked out from the surrounding disorder of the world, including my study; though whether was ever used as a prayer carpet, I don’t know.

Over these years, it’s drawn together those who sit opposite each other and talk: it’s a kind of temple or precinct that holds people together. It models the pattern of ministry expressed in those words used at parish priest’s inauguration: ‘Receive this cure of souls, which is both yours and mine.’ When bishops say those words, we aren’t dumping it all on the new priest and abandoning our responsibility with a sigh of relief: thank goodness that’s sorted, now I can forget about St Gargoyle’s in the Marsh and their new incumbent for the next seventeen years, and get on with my life. No: it’s an invitation to a partnership, in which you both need each other. I trust the parish priest to know what’s right in that corner of the diocese, and if I make it clear that I do, then she or he and that parish flourish: but they need the bishop, to remind them of the big picture to which they contribute and to keep their sights high, fixed on God and what he’s doing, so that they don’t get distracted by the limitedly parochial and club Church. We both have our feet in the same temple, whether that’s the rug in my study or the temple of God’s church.

My carpet is now pretty tatty and the edges are fraying; but though it’s losing threads and so body, the pattern is still visible. That’s the Church for you: threads may go but the pattern still holds, and it still shapes the life of the people of God. But the difference is that in the Church, unlike my carpet, the body is always being renewed. Into that great tapestry new threads are being woven all the time, as the newly baptised replace those who have gone to glory, renewing its brightness and keeping the pattern rich, fresh and clear. Like in any living body, where fresh cells replace the old entirely every seven years yet somehow we keep the same fingerprint, so the Church has the same DNA in spite of a complete physical renewal as each generation hands on to generation.


So how is the carpet of the church woven?

First, as well as shaping the pattern, the choice of every single thread is God’s. ‘Fear not, I have called you by name; you are mine.’ It’s as well to remember that the fundamental shape is God’s doing, and we’re woven into it: it’s this, and not anything that we do, that gives us life, and the basic call to us in ‘offering our souls and bodies to be a living sacrifice’ is to put ourselves at his disposal, to inhabit his pattern. That’s what liturgy means, and that’s what will glorify him: ‘the glory of God is a human person, fully alive.’ Each person is precious. And that’s why we celebrate most of the baptisms and confirmations we do here in the cathedral. We have a chance here to attend to the pattern and form the church in a way that we can’t easily do in a parish church: partly because we can gather people from all kinds of parish and school communities here, bringing them together from all over the diocese to get a taste of the church universal. But it’s also because here we’re able to telescope all the stages of discipleship in an evening’s liturgy – taking the candidates through belonging, believing, signing up, dying to self and rising to live Christ’s life, being confirmed and anointed as gifted, royal priestly people empowered to act on God’s behalf, fed at the table with food for the journey and sent out on God’s apostolic mission. Experiencing all that compactly is what we have learnt can be delivered to our new disciples, as they enter that pattern of dying to live, of learning what it means to replace getting with giving as the mainspring of your life.

But second, God doesn’t just choose the individual threads with love and care; he has the overall pattern in mind that gives shape to our life and holds the boundaries. If a carpet is self-coloured, grey pattern on grey or brown on brown, the pattern’s hardly noticeable: it’s a great solid mass. And the same with the colourful individuals who make up the church: Pentecost was a rich experience where the one gospel was preached to everyone in their own language. It’s a rich harmony that is modelled, not the flat unison. And aren’t we grateful for our key partnerships is holding this gospel truth before us? Where would we be without our partners in the Sudan? (and we ask Bishop Hilary to send our love and greetings to Archbishop Daniel) and our partners in the Diocese of Evreux, and in the Lutheran Evangelical Church of Latvia; and salute our brothers, Bishop Christian of Evreux and Archbishop Janis of Latvia, two of our Sarum Canons and thank them for their presence with us today. It is the rich, inclusive and wonderfully varied image of the Church that we celebrate, and that models for us the out-stretched arms of Christ on the cross, embracing everyone.

Third, however tatty, does the carpet glow? As well as including every person in his pattern, do the colours sing, does it draw people together within its borders, does it radiate warmth? The acid test of our life together is not what we achieve, or how tidy the pattern is; indeed, you can always tell true Persian carpets from machine made imitations, because there is a flaw, an imperfection in them – quite deliberately, because only the Almighty is perfect. And what’s the use of the church if it is full of the perfect, the flawless, the righteous? ‘I came to call not the righteous, but sinners,’ says the Lord. No, the acid test of our life together is how well we cope with our imperfections, with those who we don’t like or with those we think are wrong, and especially with those whom the exclusive societies that aim for perfection reject. If purity means narrow and dull, then it looks from even a cursory glance at creation that God is into a rich, colourful and diverse mix. God doesn’t do dull, and I suspect that ‘perfect’ and ‘pure’ are dangerous words: if you think that you are perfect, or right, and that everybody else is wrong, then there’s not going to be much of a conversation that the hearthrug (or the church) can hold you to.

Because conversations begin, not with pronouncements, but with listening; and getting this right is what the Old Testament relates God working round to. After years of trying loud and forceful – floods, exodus, mountain-top thunderclaps, kings, prophets and even exile – you can imagine God saying to himself, ‘I’m getting no-where; none of these important messages are getting through: I suppose there’s nothing for it but to go in person.’ That face to face is what you and I call the Incarnation: the Word was made flesh, and pitched his tent in our midst. Remember the Emmaus story in Luke 24: the stranger who falls in with those dispirited disciples doesn’t rush to tell them who he is; instead Jesus gets their story out of them – ‘what are you talking about?’ – before he crafts his response.

This is what makes people Fully Alive: someone actually attending to them; so the first thing God in Christ does for his people is share their life; only then does he change it. This is the pattern that God weaves for his people, and it’s ours to cherish and roll out. And when we come to live out this God-given pattern, we soon realise – even if we aren’t convinced theologically – that people can only cope with change – real, transformative change – when they feel safe; and that means when they know and trust you because you actually listen.

So the second thing God in Christ does, once he is sharing our life, is to change it. So his disciples, we, the church are in the business of change: that’s what the Gospel delivers. Change in our hearts, that we may become more generous people; change in the church, that we may model the values of God’s kingdom, not our own preferences; change in the wider world, which is longing for an alternative to trying to get your way by force, because you are frightened. We need a new currency for public discourse in our time: we’ve had enough of the false idols of money and success, and we need the language and the practice of gift and giving. The key here to what commends the gospel is not so much what we do, but how we do it: behaving generously, living joyfully, loving unreservedly are the hallmarks of a person who is growing in their discipleship of Christ, who is then free to engage attentively.

The third thing that God in Christ does for his people is hand on the pattern, and that’s a special care of the bishop. So what have we been doing today? Have I been practising what I preach for once? Before I made public my decision to resign, I told my colleagues that I didn’t want one of those funerals-before-you-are-dead kind of services to mark my going, with a lot of reminiscing about the good times, Instead, I wanted to do something that helped create the future: the good times are yet to come. I said that I’d like to end by ordaining new priests for the diocese: ensuring continuity in the ordained ministry is a proper parting gift. So that’s what we were doing this morning, and I’m proud of 23 wonderful newly minted priests, and I only wish I was lucky enough to be working with them for as long as I’ve done with so many others. What’s invigorating for me and for others is to see people respond to God’s call and for the church to recognise their gifts, whether it’s growing local ministers to ordain, or whole churches taking responsibility for their life. The interplay of lay and ordained in this diocese is second to none.

But it’s not just about attending to the threads which make this diocese a bright place: it’s about holding the bigger picture. What’s distinctive about the picture we’ve been discovering is that it’s not of our making, but only of our discovering. God is busy out there, and we are being turned around from peering into the tomb to see how the embalmed remains are faring and being re-orientated to look outwards from the church and discover what the risen Lord’s up to, so that we can gather others and help make it happen. That’s why the future’s bright: not because we’ve solutions to all the difficulties that we can see coming, but because we’re facing in the right direction, and looking ahead to life, not back into the dark of death.

I suppose I should begin to say you, and not we. I’ve always tried to say ‘we’ and not ‘I’, but saying ‘you’ doesn’t come easy. But that’s why I asked for the end of John’s gospel as the second reading. It takes up the story after the Gospel we read this morning, where Jesus breathes his life-giving Spirit over his disciples and the absent and disbelieving Thomas gets his dose of reality: it’s the wounded hands of the ridden and ascended Christ that bless us now, not some airy-fairy distant and un-believable image of untouchable perfection. Our faith does real – real sorrow, real pain, but real love and real transformation. Our life is changing – always. Set me as a seal upon your heart: for love is strong as death. Many waters cannot quench love, neither can the floods drown it. Our life may change, but love remains.

What the end of John’s gospel does is redefine Peter’s ministry, acknowledging that it’s changed, and not just restore it. Jesus’ summons to Peter, ‘Follow me’, and being trusted with the whole flock is enough for me, at the end of what seems a frequently flawed – like the best carpets – and splendidly incomplete but hugely enjoyable sojourn among you as your bishop. And for your graciousness in allowing me to enjoy the privilege these seventeen years, your partnership in the gospel, and your care and friendship, I give great thanks to God to whom with the Son and the Holy Spirit be praise, honour, glory and thanks, now and for ever. Amen.